Wednesday, May 11, 2011

The Past is Present in Placerville No. 1 Revisited: The Nick Fox House

Good morning. Gold Country sister Tina here again. Today I am going to revisit one of my favorite Placerville homes, the Nick Fox House. I first posted about this home on July 21st of last year and shared with you several old photos I had found of the house. Later Heidi added a picture she had taken of the home. (Click here to go back and see that post).


On Mothers Day, last Sunday, I worked again at the El Dorado County Museum, and since it wasn't busy (I guess most mothers don't think of museum visiting as part of their special day) I had a lot of researching time on my hands. I dug up a few more old photos of the Nick Fox House and also other homes in Placerville that I will share at another time.
An old color photograph from the 1960s.

This rather blurry photo of a photo is of the home when it was still a farmhouse in the country off Coloma Road, which is now also Highway 49. It looks so different without the large wraparound porch. The porch incorporates many wonderful rocks which contain quartz crystals and perhaps even some gold.

This photograph is even older, you can see the bridge is not here, nor the lovely rock retaining wall/fence below the home. The trees still stand tall on the hill behind.

The lovely carriage house which stands below the home is more or less just a barn in this photo. A man leads his horse at the front of the stable.

In this shot the porch has been added long before and some painting and sprucing up is being done. You can see some of the rock work on the porch columns. The living room fireplace inside is also full of wonderful old stones.

The carriage house is looking much smarter in this picture, and has its own gingerbread trim. Who would think it was once just an old barn?

After my first post on this home, I was contacted by reader who is related to the Fox family and found my post through his Internet search for a photo of his Great Grandfather's Sister's home in Placerville. His Great Great Aunt was Anna George Fox, who lived here. His mother, now 86 years young, visited her Great Aunt here when she was a child. His family plans a visit to Placerville in the future to bring his mom to revisit the family homestead. This reader also told me he has always been a Thomas Kinkade fan, and actually sent the Christmas card featuring this home to his card recipients before he found out (by way of my post) that it was his ancestors' homestead!


Another interesting thing I found out from writing the first post was that a friend I worked with for years lived in the carriage house while he was growing up.


I hope you enjoyed visiting the Nick Fox home again.

5 comments:

Twyla and Lindsey said...

Hi Tina!

What beautiful old photos! It's so amazing to see the way things used to be!

Have a lovely day!

Lindsey

yosemite faith said...

love the old photos. isn't that just too cool that the relative of that home found your blog?! just wonderful!

Heidi Ann said...

Cool! More antique photos!
You already know I love that house - so any time you want to write more about it, it's okay by me - neat post.

moonshinejunkyard said...

Oh how I love your historical Placerville posts! Don't you just wish we still had horses and carriage houses and barns as part of our daily lives? I know I romanticize the past but surely that would have been a more relaxing and joyful way to travel.

What a beautiful house, and lucky we are to have great historians like you digging up treasures and photos! Side note: I am surprised more mothers didn't visit the museum on Mother's Day? Weird. It seems like the perfect activity.

almadenmike said...

Nick Fox was my Great Granduncle -- he was an uncle to my paternal grandmother, Mary Olive Fox Ross (1895-1994). I would love to connect with the other relative who had contacted you. (Perhaps I already know that cousin, but perhaps not.)

Several cousins and I got a wonderful tour of the house from the present owner, who is fabulous. I'm delighted that this historic structure is so well taken care of.

(Mike Ross, San Jose, Calif.)